What we have to worry about is the impact on Safari’s business. Once this is known, will clients cancel out?
What will be the impact on public opinion? Will some damn fool come out screaming that safaris into the past must be stopped? You must remember, too, that Safari has paid only half of the contract fee. The other half is due in six months. They could hold up payment, or refuse payment on the second half.”
“It all depends,” said Ben, “on how Safari takes this news.”
“They’re hard-headed businessmen,” said Courtney.
“Sure, this is a tragic thing, but tragedies do happen. Miners are killed in mines, but mining still goes on. If too many clients cancel, if others don’t come in and sign up for the hunts, then they will be concerned.”
“Some may cancel,” said Ben. “Not many. I know the breed. This will only make it more zestful. Something big back there, something dangerous, let us go and get it. A bigger trophy than anyone has ever dreamed.”
“I hope you’re right,” said Courtney. “Safari is the-only deal, so far, that we have going for us. It does beat hell. We thought there’d be other big deals knocking at our door, but they’re slow developing.
The same with things we worried about. We figured the IRS would hassle us. They did come sniffing around, but that is all, so far.”
“Maybe they’re lying low,” said Ben, “trying to figure out a line of approach.”
“Maybe so,” said Courtney.
“How about the movie people?” Rila asked. “Is this lost safari going to scare them off?”
“I doubt it,” Courtney said. “All of the periods are not as dangerous as the Cretaceous, are they, Asa?”
“The Jurassic could be hairy,” I told him. “Those two would be the worst. Every period would have its dangers if you don’t watch your step. It’s all unknown country.”
“The immediate question is how to let Safari know,” said Ben. “I can phone them. But I thought we should fill you in before we did anything.”
“Why don’t you let me phone them, Ben? I know them a little better than the rest of you. Except Rila, perhaps. How about it, Rila?”
“You go ahead,” said Rila. “You’ll do a good job of it. Better than any of the rest of us.”
“They may want to call you back. Will you be there?”
“I’ll be here,” said Ben.
THIRTY
Late in the afternoon, Safari phoned Ben. They would send in an expedition, they said, to visit the scene of the disaster and bring out what remained of the victims.
Rila and I went back to Mastodonia. Neither of us had much to say on the trip; both of us were depressed.
Hiram and Bowser were waiting for us, perched on the steps. Hiram was bubbling with talk. He had found Stiffy and had a good talk with him; he had hunted up Catface and talked with him as well. Both had been glad to see him, and he had told them all about his stay in the hospital. Bowser, he said, had found a woodchuck, run him into a hole and tried to dig him out.
Hiram had hauled him from the hole and rebuked him.
Bowser, he said, was ashamed of himself. Hiram had fried some eggs for lunch, but Bowser, he reminded us severely, did not care for eggs. We should always plan to leave some cold roast for Bowser.
After dinner, Rila and I sat out on the patio. Bowser and Hiram, tired out with their day, went to bed.
“I’m worried, Asa,” Rila said. “If’ Safari has paid us only half of the contract, we may be running low on funds. We gave Ben his commission on the Safari deal even though he had nothing to do with it.”
“He had it coming,” I said. ”Maybe he had nothing to do with the Safari contract, but he worked his tail off for us.”
“I’m not complaining about it,” said Rila. “I don’t begrudge it to him. But it all adds up. The fence cost us a fortune and the office building didn’t come cheap.
The salaries for the guards run to several hundred dollars a day. We still have money, but it’s being eaten up. If Safari should pull out, if the movie people decide to wait, we could be in trouble.”
“Safari won’t pull out,” I said. “They may mark time for a while until this blows over. But Ben is right.
The more dangerous the situation, the more anxious your hunting type will be to have a shot at it. The movie company I don’t know about, but they had dollar signs in their eyes. They won’t pass it by.”
“Another thing,” said Rila. “Courtney doesn’t work cheap. God knows what kind of bill he is piling up.”
“Let’s not get upset right yet,” I said. “It will all work out.”
“You think I’m greedy, don’t you, Asa?”
“Greedy? I don’t know. You’re a businesswoman.
You spent all those years in business.”
“It’s not business,” she said. “It’s not greed. It’s security. Even more than a man, a woman needs to feel secure. Most women can feel secure in a family, but I didn’t have a family. I had to look for some other basis for security and I came up with money. Money seemed the answer. If I could pile up enough money, then I’d be secure. That’s why I am so grabby.
That’s why I latched onto the time-travel idea so fast.
I saw big possibilities in it.”
“There are still big possibilities.”
“There are also headaches. And our base is so slight.
Catface and Hiram. If either of them fails us …”
“We managed without Hiram.”
“Yes, I suppose so. But it was awfully awkward.”
“Not any more,” I said. “I’ve been trying to tell you for a couple of days, but I never had the chance.
First, there was the house, then Hiram coming back, and after that, what happened to the Safari people.
What I wanted to tell you is that I can talk with Catface.”
She looked at me in surprise. “You mean, really talk to him? Just like Hiram?”
“Better than Hiram,” I said. Then I went ahead and told her, while she watched me closely, with a faint tinge of disbelief.
“What a spooky business,” she said. “I would have been scared.”
“I wasn’t scared. I was too numb to be scared.”
“Why do you think he tried so hard? To fix it so he could talk with you?”
“He ached to talk to someone.”
“But he could talk with Hiram.”
“Hiram wasn’t here, remember? He hadn’t been for days. I don’t think Catface understood what had happened to him. And Hiram would not have been the most satisfactory person to talk to. He would have understood very little of what Catface showed to me.
Catface is a human sort of being.”
“Human?”
“Yes, human. An alien, sure. But with certain human characteristics you’d not expect to find. Perhaps he hid his alien characteristics from me, accentuated what you might call his human streak. …”
“In which case,” said Rila, “he is a very clever creature. And sophisticated.”
“Anything that has lived for a million years would have to be sophisticated.”
“Once he told us he was immortal.”
“We didn’t talk about that. Not a great deal, actually, about himself.”
“You’re fascinated by him,” Rila said.
“Yes, I suppose I am. Funny thing about it is that I have talked with an alien intelligence. That’s the kind of thing a newspaper would blow into big headlines. A sensational story. Rightly sensational, I suppose, for it is something that has been written about and talked about for years. Are there other intelligences in the universe?
